Table 2 presents the correlations between the financial measures (in a binary score) as
well as the one-year and two-year buy-and-hold market-adjusted returns (MAR) for all firms.
We present both Pearson’s correlation and Spearman rank-order’s correlation as our sample
consists of both ordinal and ratio scale. In addition to positive correlations between
increasing profitability (bROA) and increasing profit margin and turnover (b∆OPM and
b∆TATO), denoting the evidence of Dupont ROA-disaggregation framework, there is also a
positive relationship between the earnings-based and cash-flow based measures of profits
(bROA and bCFROA). Additionally, the fact that profitable firms (bROA) or firms with 11
increasing profitability (b∆ROA) are likely to have stable sales growth (bVARSG) and stable
earnings growth (bVARROA) supports our preconception about profitability.